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President Barack Obama and vulnerable Democrats facing tough midterm elections in 71 days are scrambling to prop up the moribund U.S. economy in the minds of disgruntled voters. However, one of the quickest shorthand economic measurements–food stamp enrollments–paints a startling portrait of the “new normal” in the Obama economy.

According to the Department of Agriculture’s most recently released data, the number of individuals enrolled in the food stamp program (known officially as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP) has remained above 45 million every single month for three years straight.

In May 2011, 45,410,683 individuals received food stamps. As of May 2014 (the most recent date for which data are available), 46,225,054 people were on food stamps. At no point between the two dates did the number of food stamp enrollments ever fall below the 45 million mark.

Food stamp enrollments have soared due to President Barack Obama’s categorical eligibility provisions, aggressive enrollment marketing, a bleak economy, and intense lobbying by large corporations who bag millions of taxpayer dollars as food stamp enrollments climb. Indeed, a report by the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) found that JP Morgan bagged well over half a billion dollars ($560,492,596) since 2004 processing the Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards of 18 of the 24 states it holds contracts with.

Life under the Obama administration has gotten very expensive for Americans — on both sides of the ledger. The lack of good paying jobs combined with higher prices is literally changing the way America does business.

First, a look at the “income” side of the ledger.

At just under 63 percent, our nation’s labor participation rate is the lowest it’s been since 1978, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and is projected to continue to fall over the next decade. As the nation’s workforce declines, the government safety net becomes comparatively filled with folks dependent upon government.

In fact, a record-setting 47 million people now depend on food stamps for sustenance, 13 million more than when Obama took office.

That metric alone should frighten all Americans.

Sadly, nearly 70 percent of the government’s discretionary and non-discretionary spending goes to programs which frequently trap individuals and families in long-term government dependence, according to the “2013 Index of Dependence on Government” publication by The Heritage Foundation.

Understand many of these people are hard-working Americans who’ve simply become casualties of Obama’s failing policies, which not only fail to provide a path out of poverty, but actually penalize success!

For those Americans fortunate enough to be working, the average workweek continues to decline with private, nonfarm payrolls now at 34.5 hours. I predict this weekly average will continue to fall as the Obamacare employer mandate kicks in requiring all businesses with over 50 full-time employees (employees who average 30 hours or more) to provide health coverage or pay a fine.

Frankly, this administration either doesn’t understand or isn’t willing to acknowledge the impending storm. Many employers will be financially forced to cap hiring below 50 employees, keep the employee’s average hours below 30, or pay the fine — whichever is least expensive. And with many of these jobs being low-paying retail positions, people will be forced into working multiple jobs simply to survive.

Now let’s look at the “expense” side of the ledger.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the average price of a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in the U.S. was $1.83 the day before Obama took office. During his presidency it has risen over 96 percent to an average price last week of $3.68. And gasoline prices are a serious concern for individuals considering returning to the workforce versus staying home.

Retail food prices under the Obama administration are also skyrocketing due to commodity and fuel prices, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. From 2010 to 2011 alone, beef prices are up 10 percent, eggs and pork over 8 percent while fish and seafood are up over 6 percent, just to name a few staples.

Even a liberal should be able to understand that fewer good paying jobs combined with higher prices will result in increased dependence upon government, which in turn, will use the tax revenue from those employed to subsidize government programs supporting the unemployed — sort of taking from those who “have” for those who “have not.”

Hmm … that sounds like redistribution of wealth.

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

CNSNews.com) – In 20 percent of American families in 2013, according to new data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), not one member of the family worked.

A family, as defined by the BLS, is a group of two or more people who live together and who are related by birth, adoption or marriage. In 2013, there were 80,445,000 families in the United States and in 16,127,000—or 20 percent–no one had a job.

The BLS designates a person as “employed” if “during the survey reference week” they “(a) did any work at all as paid employees; (b) worked in their own business, profession, or on their own farm; (c) or worked 15 hours or more as unpaid workers in an enterprise operated by a member of the family.”

Members of the 16,127,000 families in which no one held jobs could have been either unemployed or not in the labor force. BLS designates a person as unemployed if they did not have a job but were actively seeking one. BLS designates someone as not in the labor force if they did not have a job and were not actively seeking one. (An elderly couple, in which both the husband and wife are retired, would count as a family in which no one held a job.)

In 20% of American Families, No One Works-1

Of the 80,445,000 families in the United States in 2013, there were 7,685,000—or about 9.6 percent—in which at least one family member unemployed.

The BLS has been tracking data on employment in families since 1995. That year, the percent of families in which no one had a job was 18.8 percent. The percentage hit an all-time high of 20.2 percent in 2011. It held steady at 20 percent in in 2012 and 2013.

The data on employment in families is based on Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey of the civilian noninstitutional population, which includes people 16 and older, who are not on active duty in the military or in an institution such as a prison, nursing home or mental hospital.

The Cloward–Piven strategy is a political strategy outlined in 1966 by American sociologists and political activists Richard Cloward (1926–2001) and Frances Fox Piven (b. 1932) that called for overloading the U.S. public welfare system in order to precipitate a crisis that would lead to a replacement of the welfare system with a national system of “a guaranteed annual income and thus an end to poverty”. Cloward and Piven were a married couple who were both professors at the Columbia University School of Social Work. The strategy was formulated in a May 1966 article in left-wing[1] magazine The Nation titled “The Weight of the Poor: A Strategy to End Poverty